1. Meet Krist Wilde. He’s a pastor in Boise, ID at a church called Capital Christian Center. In today’s culture, we are all two clicks away from a message from any mega church pastor we want to listen to. To be a great communicator sometimes means you just have to have a likable personality on stage, or you can just copy what you podcasted and maybe that will “work.” But to be a great communicator of the GOSPEL, I believe it demands a dedication to really studying scripture. I don’t know Krist at all or his study habits, but when I listen to him preach, there’s an excellence that he brings to the pulpit that I believe truly honors the gospel. He seems like a guy who takes his job seriously. You can listen to a message and see what Capital Christian Center is up to here.

2. Meet Promise Tangeman. I was honored to share a lab session at Catalyst Dallas earlier this month with Promise and what she does is phenomenal! Besides being a top tier graphic designer, she runs a company called Sitehouse Designs. They create templates for creatives to use to build their own sites. It’s super easy to use. It’s great for start ups and for small companies that don’t need anything fancy. One of the unique things Sitehouse does is a workshop called Go Live. It’s a 2 day workshop for creatives that want to implement a Sitehouse design for  a site, ask questions, and get feedback. And on the 2nd day, you hit publish and go live! Promise and her team will help you create a fresh online presence that you’ll be proud to call your own. I love that. P.s. Promise’s husband, Brian, is pretty legit too. Good people.

Ariel Castro was arrested on May 6, 2013, shortly after the women were freed. On May 8, Castro was charged with four counts of kidnapping and three counts of rape, charges that carry prison sentences of 10 years to life. And then a CNN alert came on my phone letting me know Castro’s bail was set at $8 million. Allegedly there are even more additional charges pending, including aggravated murder (for terminating the pregnancies), attempted murder, assault, a charge for each instance of rape, and a kidnapping charge for each day each victim was held captive. 

When I watch the video, I was crying laughing. As I’ve read the back story, my heart breaks for these girls. From tears of laughter to tears of sorrow, I just sit back and am in awe of how God can use anybody. After 10 years of HORRIBLE experiences, I’m sure the rescuer these girls dreamed of was not Charles Ramsey, but then again, wouldn’t you accept anybody to rescue you. I have to wonder what unlikely characters may be present in my life that I look past because they didn’t come wrapped in the package I normally look for.

And lastly, I look at the life of Ariel Castro. If I’m honest, I can’t help but rank myself amongst sinners. I mean… I’ve got a long laundry list of sins, but reading the second paragraph of this post makes me feel like I’m doing ok. And to watch our government put a PRICE on what would set this man free at $8 million I thought, “Who would care about this guy enough to drop that kind of cash on him?”. Only one guy, one God that would do that. Jesus. And it’s at this point that I realize that the wages of my own sin cost much more than $8 million. I deserved hell, and it’s a reality I need to embrace everyday.

When Phil Jackson, who also has 10 other NBA titles along with this one, was asked what he would attribute to their success that particular  year, his response was surprising. He didn’t say, “Well, we did have the greatest basketball player ever in Michael Jordan“, or “Dennis Rodman’s rebounding is what really kept us together that year“, or “Our defense was spectacular. You know, defense wins championships.” He said, “We simply stayed healthy for a whole year. No one really got hurt. If a good team can stay fully healthy for a year, they can do wonders.”

No matter what career path you’ve found yourself on, I would suspect that you love winning, right? I think what Phil Jackson would say in your leadership meeting is, “Stay Healthy.” If you were to ask your colleagues about the culture of your organization, would they say it was healthy? You can be as talented as you want to be, and you can recruit as much talent as you want, but if your talent isn’t healthy, they can’t win. Some say that Phil Jackson isn’t just a great basketball coach, but that he was the greatest manager of talent and could coach the uncoachable. Part of creating a healthy culture is also managing personalities well.

2 Ways to Create a Healthy Culture

1. Anonymous Evaluations – You have to be able to get honest feedback from those above, around, and below you. If you’re in a Christian organization, most people, ironically, will lie to you because they want to be nice. You have to retrieve HONEST feedback to get better, and to stay healthy.

2. Staff Getaways – Find an inexpensive hotel that may only be an hour away or anything and just get away with your staff. You can’t manage people well if you only really know them in the context of ministry. Too often we find out too late that somebody’s marriage was struggling because our only conversation with them was based on how they’re small group was going.

What are some ways you think you can create a healthy culture?

In other words, whoever you’re trying to reach, you have to have them around the table. The more and more churches I work with, I hear this conversation about reaching “lost” people… with no lost people at the table. That’d be the equivalent of a bunch of white Americans saying, “We’re gonna go reach Japan for Christ”… without having any Japanese friends. It doesn’t even make sense. First of all, what “lost” person do you actually spend time with? When was the last time your lost network expanded from the gym to your house?

Here’s a ridiculous suggestion: Go somewhere where you think there’s lost people. It can be the mall, a restaurant, and dare I say, a bar. When you get there, be honest, and say, “I’m looking for someone who never goes to church.” This may all be an awkward situation until you tell them you want to PAY THEM to come to your church that weekend. You’re merely putting together a focus group and simply letting them know, “You’re the type of person we would want to come to our church and you may be the only person who can help us.” And now the greatest contract employee you’ve ever rented is a bar tender 1 mile from your church.

When they come, [and they will because people like getting paid for little to nothing], don’t tell anyone that they’re coming. Let them fully experience your church by themselves and after church, buy them lunch and ask them 10 questions about their experience. Whatever is said during that lunch meeting will make great material for your staff meeting Monday morning. And who knows, maybe the product we’re selling works, and someone might actually give their life to Jesus in the process.

I love celebrating what God is doing all around the country. I don’t get to see everybody and everything, but there’s enough haters out there to go around. I have simply chosen to be a person that encourages people to stay in the fight. There’s one church that I’ve gotten to know of the past year that is straight up fighting for Chicago. The church is called City Church Chicago.

Brian Houston, pastor of Hillsong Church, was asked how to create culture. He responded, “You don’t create culture. You are it. BE the culture.” I have never seen the words lived out more than in Kent & Alli Munsey. They pastor City Church Chicago in a way that I’ve never seen. I’m not just saying that to brag on them. I REALLY have never seen anything like it. The church has ONE employee. And everything else that makes up City Church is ran by volunteers. And their volunteers are no joke!

I get to visit City Church about once every month if not once every other month and on one of my visits I happen to catch food poisoning. Stupid. My brother lives about 90 minutes outside of Chicago and so I went to visit him and laid sick on his couch for a few days. In the midst of my illness, I get a text from a City Church volunteer saying, “Can we bring you anything?” I responded, “No, it’s ok, I’m about 90 minutes or so outside of Chicago now. I’ll be fine.” And they responded, “Like I said before, can we bring you anything?” That was impressive to me until this next story happen.

City Church is a growing church and considering some expansion out of their AMAZING vintage theatre that they meet in. One of the volunteers, who works for a professional architecture firm downtown Chicago, was giving me a tour of the building in parts that hadn’t been renovated yet. It’s was 6:30pm on a Monday night and a guy walks in fresh from working downtown in corporate America wearing dress pants, shirt, tie, and the works. He asked the other volunteer for the keys, and I asked him what he needed keys for just because I was curious. He said, “Oh, I’m here to clean to the toilets.” A leader/volunteer heard about the expense the church was paying for cleaning maintenance and spoke up in a meeting and said, “I can get a group of guys to take care of that for free.”

What Kent & Alli are building in Chicago is incredible, but it’s not built on really great “systems”. It’s built on a heart that is willing to do anything to reach a city for Jesus. City Church Chicago… is good people.

1. Failing to Find a Project for the Talent that Ignites Their Passion. Sometimes the idea is that your volunteer who is a CFO at a company in your city should serve in the Kids department when he’s really good with money. Should he help oversee your budget? Maybe not. But could you ask him sit down with your staff one on one once a quarter and go over personal finances? Yes. Ignite his passion. Don’t guilt him into serving you.

2. The Missing Vision Thing. This might sound obvious, but is the future of your organization exciting? What strategy are you executing? What is the vision you want this talented person to fulfill? Did they have a say/input into this vision? 

3. Top Talent likes other Top Talent. What are the rest of the people around your top talent like? Many organizations keep some people on the payroll that rationally shouldn’t be there that make the environment laborious for talented people. 

4. Lack of Open-Mindedness. This is the one I hear the most. Organizations can be so STUBBORN. You don’t have to change. Your talent just wants you to be OPEN to it.

Now, here’s the reasons I’ve discovered aside from Forbes:

5. Dictatorship. At some point, people can start to feel like they’re serving a pastor and not the kingdom. You can call it the “kingdom work” all you want, but it can easily become about you and the “vision God gave the pastor.” The thing about talented people is that they are constantly exposed to other environments. Key leaders want to serve the kingdom, not a dictator who is controlling of their every move. “Yes” men can only take you so far.

6. Salary. This gets tricky because everyone’s budget is different, but you have value your leaders. If you give a honorarium to a guest speaker that is higher than the salary your lowest paid staff person, you can’t be shocked if people are leaving your organization. Some churches value consultants more than they do their kids pastor. There are many things we can’t afford, but we all can afford the things we value the most.

7. Abuse of Their Time. When you don’t respect a leaders time, why should they want to show up with a good attitude? If you’re the boss, you’re most likely the HIGHEST PAID person in your organization. It’s a whole lot easier for you to give your all and give up sleep to drive the organization forward. Churches can burn their staff out fast under the umbrella of “kingdom vision.”

8. Desire to Use Their Talent in Your Church AND others. Talented leaders more and more have a simple desire to travel. Often times, it sends a signal that they are bought into the vision and aren’t really present in the local church. Develop trust with these leaders and let them travel. Give them a great home to come to. And when they get an opportunity to serve the kingdom in another city, SUPPORT them. My church makes it incredibly difficult to go somewhere simply because of how they support my travel schedule.

What are some reasons you think key leaders would want to transition?

I came across this video the other night and it made me smile, but also convicted me. The next day I drove past a Men’s Wearhouse and I thought, “I wonder who could be in there now?“.

Is your life built upon the idea that if you just play your part as best you can to make church awesome, then lost people will come? Or is this something in you that drives you to go find them? Is the goal to be like Bishop Jakes or fill in the blank with whoever is doing it “big” in your world, or is the goal to be like this lady who was just passionate about not letting one more person walk away from God?

“Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it?” – Jesus.

I read the above and think, “That’s what a friend does.” That’s not what a Facebook friend does. That’s what real friends do. They help each other find strength in the Lord especially when they’re in a desert. You’re reading this right now and I bet you know at least one person who’s just in a dry place searching for God knows what. DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT.

I’m challenged to be more than the average friend. Yes, let’s hang out, let’s laugh, let’s eat, let’s shop, let’s hoop, but could it be that I’m friends with the people I’m friends with right now for a reason? Could it be that God strategically placed them in my life and I in theirs for a reason? Come on. We’re better than we’ve been. We’re not meant to be just friends. We’re meant to come alongside each other and strengthen one another in the Lord to help them fulfill the mission that God has placed on their life.

1. Danny Hoyt. You may or may not have heard of Danny, but just keep watching every award show for the next few years and sooner or later, you’ll see this man on the red carpet interviewing celebrities. Over the past few years Danny has hosted many events around the country for Kia, the NBA, and several musical artists. I believe in Danny Hoyt and know that God will honor the hard work he puts in to wear many hats. His passion for life and Jesus will make an impact on Los Angeles. Danny is good people.

2. Kirk Graham. Kirk is one of the worship leaders and creative at River Valley Church in Minnesota. Check out their worship album here. There’s not many playlist I make on my iPad that don’t have at least one RVC track on it. I have never met someone who is more anxious to change the world for Jesus than Kirk. Uber-talented worship leader? Yes. Passionate and engaging? Yes. Heart for the local church? Yes. But when Kirk and I met in college, he asked me if there was anything he could do for me as a leader of our university’s late night Wednesday worship gathering. I said, “Yes, I need someone to run power point.” And he ran that sucker for 7 months in a back room with crappy audio of the live service with a smile on his face and a Red Bull. I had never heard him sing or lead until someone else told me he had skills and leadership capability. My mouth dropped the first time I ever heard him and could not believe he never told me that he could sing or lead. His heart was truly in a place where he just wanted to serve. I’ll never forget that and am beyond proud of everything he’s putting his hands to.

These dudes treat their wives like queens. It’s cool to see guys like them represent my generation well.

I heard Bishop Jakes say, “Never give your stage to the devil.” He was referring to being very cautious about what outside issues you address in church and which ones you do not. When I think of discouragement, I think of a person’s mind being a stage, it’s open mic there, and the enemy is going to town. “You’re too young, you don’t have enough experience, you don’t enough swag, you’re too radical, you’re not unique and people want unique, you’re good but not great.” And here’s the deal, every single time you read the Bible, it’s like you’re giving God the mic on a stage in your head. 

Stop giving your enemy a mic in your head. It’s dumb. He doesn’t belong on that stage.